User:Hcberkowitz/Sandbox-Tanker War

The Tanker War is variously considered a separate campaign of the Iran-Iraq War, or a war primarily between Iran and the United States. Iraq clearly was part of provoking it, but there is no indication that the U.S. coordinated its operations with Iraq during the various military engagements; indeed, Iraq attacked the USS Stark, a U.S. frigate, killing 37 sailors.

Iranian and Iraqi attacks on tankers

Naval operations came to a halt, presumably because Iraq and Iran had lost many of their ships, by early 1981; the lull in the fighting lasted for two years. In March 1984, Iraq initiated sustained naval operations in its self-declared 1,126-kilometer maritime exclusion zone, extending from the mouth of the Shatt al Arab to Iran's port of Bushehr.

In 1984 Iraq acquired French-made Exocet missiles, which were used to launch attacks on Iranian oil facilities in the Persian Gulf. Iran retaliated by attacking tankers loaded with Arab oil, claiming that the profits of such oil helped to finance loans and grants to Iraq. Iraq responded by attacking ships loaded with Iranian oil, thus launching what became known as the tanker war.

By the beginning of 1985, the third phase of the war had begun. During this phase, Iran consciously sought to break out of its diplomatic isolation by making overtures to various countries in an effort to win international support for its war objectives. The dramatic decline of international oil prices, beginning in the autumn of 1985, spurred the Iranian initiatives and led to significantly improved relations with such countries as Oman and Saudi Arabia.

Iraq responded to Iran's diplomatic initiatives by intensifying its attacks on Iran-related shipping in the Persian Gulf. Iranian retaliation increasingly focused on Kuwaiti shipping by early 1987. Iran's actions prompted Kuwait to request protection for its shipping from both the Soviet Union and the United States. By the summer of 1987, most European and Arab governments were blaming Iran for the tensions in the Gulf, and Iran again found itself diplomatically isolated.

In 1981 Baghdad had attacked Iranian ports and oil complexes as well as neutral tankers and ships sailing to and from Iran; in 1984 Iraq expanded the socalled tanker war by using French Super-Etendard combat aircraft armed with Exocet missiles. Neutral merchant ships became favorite targets, and the long-range Super-Etendards flew sorties farther south. Seventy-one merchant ships were attacked in 1984 alone, compared with forty-eight in the first three years of the war. Iraq's motives in increasing the tempo included a desire to break the stalemate, presumably by cutting off Iran's oil exports and by thus forcing Tehran to the negotiating table. Repeated Iraqi efforts failed to put Iran's main oil exporting terminal at Khark Island out of commission, however. Iran retaliated by attacking first a Kuwaiti oil tanker near Bahrain on May 13 and then a Saudi tanker in Saudi waters five days later, making it clear that if Iraq continued to interfere with Iran's shipping, no Gulf state would be safe.

In September 1987, Iraqi warplanes and Iranian naval vessels hit eight ships in about 36 hours in the Persian Gulf in the most concentrated assault on shipping since the Iran-Iraq war. Military analysts believe that Iraq's attacks on ships and oil installations, coming in the face of American objections, are a calculated effort to engage the United States and other nations in the gulf war.

Ismat Kittani, Iraq's Ambassador to the United Nations, Wednesday reiterated his country's rationale for renewing the maritime war, in which Iraq has an overwhelming advantage. No country is going to fight a war imposed on it with its most effective weapon denied action, Ambassador Kittani said on the CBS Morning News.

In Teheran on Tuesday, Prime Minister Mir Hussein Moussavi was quoted by Iranian radio as saying Iran would retaliate against any Iraqi attack. The policy of blow-by-blow will be followed in a calculated way, he said, adding that such a posture would help to foil pressures and conspiracies in order to impose an American peace upon us."

Reflagging

As Kuwaiti vessels made up a large portion of the targets in these retaliatory raids, the Kuwaiti government sought protection from the international community in the fall of 1986. The Soviet Union responded first, agreeing to charter several Soviet tankers to Kuwait in early 1987. Washington, which has been approached first by Kuwait and which had postponed its decision, eventually followed Moscow's lead.

Ironically, Washington used the Stark incident to blame Iran for escalating the war and sent its own ships to the Gulf to escort eleven Kuwaiti tankers that were "reflagged" with the American flag and had American crews. Iran refrained from attacking the United States naval force directly, but it used various forms of harassment, including mines, hit-and-run attacks by small patrol boats, and periodic stop-and-search operations. On several occasions, Tehran fired its Chinese-made Silkworm missiles on Kuwait from Al Faw Peninsula. When Iranian forces hit the reflagged tanker Sea Isle City in October 1987, Washington retaliated by destroying an oil platform in the Rostam field and by using the United States Navy's Sea, Air, and Land (SEAL) commandos to blow up a second one nearby.

Within a few weeks of the Stark incident, Iraq resumed its raids on tankers but moved its attacks farther south, near the Strait of Hormuz. Washington played a central role in framing UN Security Council Resolution 598 on the Gulf war, passed unanimously on July 20; Western attempts to isolate Iran were frustrated, however, when Tehran rejected the resolution because it did not meet its requirement that Iraq should be punished for initiating the conflict. The covert Operation Prime Chance Operation Prime Chance (August 1987-June 1989) was a United States Special Operations Command operation intended to protect U.S.-flagged oil tankers from Iranian attack during the Iran-Iraq War. The operation took place roughly at the same time as Operation Earnest Will (July 1987-December 1988), the largely Navy effort to escort the tankers through the Persian Gulf.